Air pollution and COVID-19 lockdown in a large South American city: Santiago Metropolitan Area, Chile.

ABSTRACT: The implementation of confinement and physical distancing measures to restrict people's activities and transit in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic allowed us to study how these measures affect the air quality in urban areas with high pollution rates, such as Santiago, Chile. A comparative study between the concentrations of PM10, PM2.5, NOx, CO, and O3 during the months of March to May 2020 and the corresponding concentrations during the same period in 2017-2019 is presented. A combination of surface measurements from the air quality monitoring network of the city, remote satellite measurements, and simulations of traffic activity and road transport emissions allowed us to quantify the change in the average concentrations of each pollutant. Average relative changes of traffic emissions (

SUBMITTER: Toro A R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7881733 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature